Chris Grant’s Report Card

The Cavs’ record is 15-26. They’re half way to 30 wins for the season. For most of us, they are falling short of pre-season expectations.

The optimists among us see the “glass” as half full: the Cavs are still an up and coming, extremely young team that has developing talent and a slew of draft picks coming over the next three years. They have a strong organization and they are stocked with high character people from the top of the roster to the front office to the owner.

The pessimists among us see the glass as half empty: the Cavs seem to have a coaching staff that is still unable to master offensive execution. They allowing their young players to develop habits that are anathemas to winning. And they’ve a front office that consistently fails to make good talent evaluation decisions. The Cavs just selected the least productive NBA number one draft pick since 1955’s Dick Ricketts. They spent nearly $11 million dollars worth of cap room last summer on two free agents that are playing terribly.

The “truth” is somewhere between those two viewpoints. But, it’s fair to ask: do the Cavaliers have an organization that is on a path to success, or do they need to make wholesale changes to the way they operate to ensure that mistakes aren’t repeated? Chris Grant, as general manager, is often at the center of these discussions. The only way to judge is to make a completely arbitrary report card on the moves from last few years, and to calculate the GPA.

The Luol Deng trade: the Cavs’ leveraged the creative contract of Andrew Bynum to bring in a two time all-star and to fill the biggest positional talent hole on their roster. They gave up very little in terms of future assets to do so. But, if the Cavs cannot re-sign Deng, extend him, and/or turn that signing into a positive playoff appearance and a “change of culture,” then they’ve just spun their wheels. (This “subject” also includes the results of the Hickson-Casspi-Sacramento Kings Draft pick saga). Grade: Incomplete

2013 Free Agency: the Cavs let “The Herculoids” walk. Livingston, Walton, Speights, and Ellington all left, and were replaced by Jarrett Jack, Earl Clark, Andrew Bynum (now Luol Deng), and Henry Sims. Livingston and Speights are playing below average basketball, and Walton (coaching) and Ellington (DNP-CD city) aren’t playing at all. Bynum was traded for Deng. Clark and Jack have been pretty bad. The Cavs outscore their opponents by 3.9 and 7.6 points per hundred possessions, respectively, when those two players sit. (Un?)fortunately, Jack has three more seasons at $6+ million per to turn it around. Grade: D

No. 19 and 33 picks, 2013 NBA Draft: We’ve not seen enough of Karasev or Felix to know whether they can be any good or not, but neither of them have ever blown us away. Grade: Incomplete

Matthew Dellavedova: The Cavs’ best rookie is currently an undrafted free agent who got a look because he played a pick-up game with Mike Brown’s son. Another crisis of perception here: was this an example of keen observation and taking advantage of opportunities, or just an indictment of the Cavs scouting department? Grade: B

Mike Brown: This hire was the opposite of the Browns’ current coaching search ordeal. Basically, Dan Gilbert took Mike Brown to dinner, ignored my 5000 word coaching search almanac, and said, “Hey, you wanna be coach again?” The Cavs currently rank 25th in offensive efficiency and 14th in defensive efficiency (from ESPN.com). They run some of the least creative crunch time offense in the league, and are 27th in Effective Field Goal percentage. Grade: C

The “Herculoids” Trade: Cleveland turned John Leuer and cap space into a future first round pick from Memphis. Grade (despite our love of Jon Leuer): A

2012 Free Agency: Cleveland signed C.J. Miles to a two year, $4.45 million dollar contract. For a starting two guard posting his shooting numbers and an above average PER, that’s a pretty good bang for your buck. Grade: A-

2012 Free Agency: Cavs signed Alonzo Gee to a contract with guarantees of $6.75 million over two years. They probably could have just gotten another D-Leaguer. Grade: C-

2010, Byron Scott hire. Byron came in and coached a 2010 Cavs team that was bereft of talent, coached Kyrie into an All-Star in his second year, turned the Herculoids into an effective unit, and was responsible for a staggering number of late game collapses and effort fails in 2012 and 2013. Grade: C

GPA: 2.09 (feel free to check my math). Grant graduates, but barely. The problem with a C-level GPA is that the Cavs operate with a much lower margin for error than most other NBA teams. They don’t have the warm weather of Miami, L.A., Golden State, Orlando, Houston, Phoenix or Dallas. They don’t have the major city or the team tradition of New York, Boston, or Chicago. Cleveland operates from a position where they have consistently make good decisions to build a winning team, much like Oklahoma City, San Antonio, and Indiana.

I imagine the notes from the parent-teacher conferences would go something like this.

Mid-season trades, seem to be Grant’s best subject. When it comes to drafting, the Bennett pick has plummeted Grant’s draft GPA to 1.1. He needs to work on not drafting busts! Grant reads Cliff’s Notes when it comes to free agency, instead of the actual book. He frequently misses reading box scores and advanced stats (see Earl Clark), and seems to struggle with conceptualizing how players will actually fit on the team he’s already assembled, and how coaches will develop those players and put them in a position to succeed. Grant has had problems evaluating head coaching and player talent. Grant fits in well, and is a good community contributor, but he struggles to stand out. The kid loves pudding, kickball, and Salisbury steak. Love his gumption!

This is a grossly unfair evaluation. Just as parents have a lot to do with students’ success, Dan Gilbert has a lot to do with Grant’s (and his sometimes lack thereof). It is unclear how many moves within the Cavs’ organization are Grant’s and how many are Gilbert’s. Did Gilbert pass on Big-V because he wanted a rookie to play in 2011? Was the Brown hiring and Cleveland’s lack of a remotely professional interview process the fault of Dan or Chris? Heck, the Cavs list David Griffin as V.P. of Basketball Operations, how many of these grades are his fault? Just who was responsible for Gum Drop Bear? Maybe C students do rule the world….

It is certainly within the GM’s job description to fall on his sword for an NBA owners’ sometimes petulant wishes. And another part of the job is bearing the brunt of criticism from fans and the media. But, not knowing who is responsible is kind of the whole point. Grant may lack the gravitas to sublimate Dan Gilbert’s most destructive impulses. In light of this, the Cavs would be well served to bring in a strong personality with a history of astute personnel and coaching moves to run the franchise, and they should do it now. Scouting the current crop of NCAA players and pending NBA free agents is going to be crucial to improving the Cavs going forward. No matter whether it’s Gilbert, Griffin, or Grant, the Cavs can’t afford to be run by a C student, and they definitely can’t afford a summer as disastrous as 2013, again. This doesn’t mean that Grant should necessarily be kicked out of Cavalier High School. With a strong mentor, he may be able to get his grades back up.

I have my own ideas about who that person should be, but I’d like to hear yours. Do you think these grades were fair? Do you think Chris Grant should keep his job and keep running this franchise? Who would you bring in to run it? (I mean besides the CtB staff).

43 Responses to “Chris Grant’s Report Card”

I wouldn’t put much stock in the slew of draft picks. The Heat pick will be very late in the first round. They could get a late lottery pick from Memphis next year. Neither of those will turn around the franchise. The Cavs’ only chance of adding a star player through the draft comes from tanking this year.

Regarding the passing over of My Name is Jonas…I vaguely remember hearing whispers that JV didn’t want to be drafted by the Cavs and was threatening to not come stateside to play for us. Am I just completely making this stuff up, or was there any truth behind that? I thought I remembered reading it somewhere here around the time of that draft (maybe before, maybe after), but if there is any basis to that, it has to be factored in to the grade of drafting TT.

Really well written piece and, I think, fair. I’m an eternal optimist and as a high school teacher I constantly look for strengths in people’s character, but I think we need to see that our picture in CLE is mixed, at best. We’ve got a weird team dynamic and a lack of leadership. I’ve always like Brown as a person but I remember throwing a remote at the TV during the series with Orlando and slumping in my chair with 4th quarter ISO’s during the LeBron Era. But this may also be a “wait and see” thing. My guess is that Grant and Gilbert recognized that this is a building project and won’t look nice ’till it’s finished. Over fancy dinners with MB, they probably talked about the long view. MB has said numerous times this team WILL be really good, recognizing that they are not right now. Building a defensive culture quickly and with the pieces we had in the fall was too much to expect. However, I think making the playoffs was a reasonable expectation, and we may fall short of that. If that happens, I predict Grant takes the fall and I won’t feel bad about it.

JNeids: Yeah, that was a concern about JV, but so what? I never understood that. Who cares if he came over in a lockout year anyway? Also, draft him and trade his rights… Anyway, I’m not saying JV over TT was the right choice. I gave the TT move a “B.” I’m not sure Kawhi Leonard even gets developed correctly if he comes to Cleveland. It was a tough draft.

Something that should be considered in Grants grading would be some of the moves he did not make. We had a $7milion trade exception from the LeBron deal that we let expire. I’m not sure who/what we could have gotten for it, but seems like a waste to not use it.

We were also invloved with a lot of rumours around being a team in the Dwight Howard/Andrew Bynum etc. trade scenarios. I’m not sure how much credence to give to them, but I do recall an ESPN report saying something to the effect that Grant seemed to ‘overvalue’ his assets and the Cavs seemed to be a difficult team to deal with. IF we could have closed certain deals that Grant did not pull the trigger on – seems like these non-deals (if confirmed) should be a part of the grading. Again, not sure how, but when there is smoke there is often fire.

When JV’s agent was asked about the rumours about not wanting to come to Cleveland, he denied them and said JV just wanted to play for whomever drafted him. JV later said same thing (all per ESPN). It seems that the rumour existed only in fantasy land and nobody has put any truth to it. Regardless, IF the Cavs wanted JV they shouldn’t have let rumours stop them. I’m not sure how to ‘grade’ Grant for not taking a player, but there definitely seemed to be other talent that was reasonable with this pick that may/not worked as well as TT. There isn’t a obvious/most logical pick other than JV at that #4 slot, so IF JV becomes an all-star or true impact player and TT doesn’t, I would lower Grants grade, but as of now B is reasonable.

I think the Waiters grade is too high, I’d give it more like a C-. Simple school analogy would be chemestry. Sometimes two elements just don’t mix with each other. You don’t fail a student for trying something new and mixing various elements, but the student should recognize when two elements are pretty similar to each other so shouldn’t expect much out of the combination. Grant should have known that Dion and Kyrie just don’t mix well on the court. Barnes, IMO was the clear choice here as it satisfied a position of need and would have mixed nicely. Not saying Barnes will be a better player long-term than Dion (if he does the grade may be reduced even further). But certain elements make sense to mix to make something more well balanced and complete. Adding two elements that do the same thing is somewhat wasteful.

Nupe. Waiters, based on pure talent, is probably a B-, but I get where you’re coming from. But to take Barnes over him? Barnes just isn’t very good so far. 10 PER, -7.0 Simple rating, -2.52 APM. He had a good playoffs, and somewhat suffers from low usage, but Waiters is an order of magnitude more effective as a player. If you want to argue Lillard or Drummond there, I think you have something, but Barnes would have been a D+.

@Nate..I tend to agree with your analysis…I have a sinking feeling that Gilbert is Jerry-Jonesing a lot of these decisions. If that’s the case, there’s no hope no matter who is in the front office. I also think your MB grade needs to be lower (because (1) he’s not a good coach and (2) his role in recommending Clark and Bennett). He’s the worst new head coach in the league and arguably the worst in the entire league…that’s not a passing grade.

I think TT deserves better than a B. He is either the 2nd or 3 best player for the Cavs in that entire draft depending on if you prefer JV or TT. There is no way Klay and Kwahi develop like they did on this team. Getting 2 of the top 3 players in a draft is deserving of an A especially if have 1&4.

I think it’s unfair to give Bennett an F and the Deng trade an incomplete. Either it’s F and at least a B or its two in-completes. It’s only not an A because of the draft pick we gave up IMO.

Also its blatantly unfair that you skipped over the Mo Williams for Baron Davis and Kyrie Irving trade.

Funny I put the Jaret Jack move on Gilbert/Brown a lot more than Clark or Bennett. I actually know that Bennett was Grant’s guy for months before the draft so that’s not on Brown. Jaret Jack always seemed like a brown guy to me.

I don’t think Clark deserves an F individually even if Jaret Jack is the worst signing this franchise has made since the 90’s. Clark is on a non-guaranteed deal which provides value in itself (see Andrew Bynum) and you didn’t give grades for easy/obvious/inconsequential good moves like drafting Irving or turning one second round pick into 2 so giving Clark his own F would be unfair.

To me I give Bennett an incomplete and keep Deng as an incomplete. To much still has to play out to decide how bad a move that was. Change Thompson to an A, add an A for the Irving trade/selection but move the 2013 FA signings to an F. Bynum was nice and Clark isn’t a disaster but Jack is so unbelievably bad he sinks the whole class.

The Bulls are without Hinrich and Boozer tonight. A win tonight at least keeps us at 2 games back and helps Chicago with their post Rose and Deng slide. The game tonight could be huge when it comes to seeding for the playoffs. If the team comes out flat tonight it is not a good sign for the rest of the year and really for the coaching staff.

“The problem with a C-level GPA is that the Cavs operate with a much lower margin for error than most other NBA teams. They don’t have the warm weather of Miami, L.A., Golden State, Orlando, Houston, Phoenix or Dallas. They don’t have the major city or the team tradition of New York, Boston, or Chicago. Cleveland operates from a position where they have consistently make good decisions to build a winning team, much like Oklahoma City, San Antonio, and Indiana”

This is so true, but the other major factor here is luck. OKC got lucky that Portland took Oden, SAS got lucky that Duncan didn’t bolt for Orlando to play w/G Hill way back when, Indiana got lucky that 9 other teams passed on P George….etc

Considering the Cavs luck: I feel we have been very lucky post LBJ. The odds of getting KI out of the LAC deal were not good & the odds of getting the #1 pick LY were not good. To continue your analogy, this was a relatively easy Curriculum to turn around a team: Four top 5 picks, 2 additional Lottery picks & a boatload of cash. Given the quality of the East, the fact that we aren’t better should keep Chris Gant up at night.

Great article, I love the approach to tackling this subject.
“The problem with a C-level GPA is that the Cavs operate with a much lower margin for error than most other NBA teams. They don’t have the warm weather of Miami, L.A., Golden State, Orlando, Houston, Phoenix or Dallas. They don’t have the major city or the team tradition of New York, Boston, or Chicago. Cleveland operates from a position where they have consistently make good decisions to build a winning team, much like Oklahoma City, San Antonio, and Indiana.” Amen.
One factor that needs to be considered in all of this is “degree of difficulty.” OKC, SAS, & Indy have all been smart & LUCKY. OKC lucked out that Portland took Oden, SAS lucked out that Duncan didn’t flee to Orlando to play with Grant Hill way back when & Indy lucked out that 9 teams passed on P George. I would consider the Cavs to have been very lucky post decision: the clippers pick should not have been a #1 and we were lucky to land the top spot again LY. Also, the cap room that was cleared out gave Grant flexibility to bring in more talent and he whiffed.
In summary, Grant had four top-5 picks, two more lotto picks & cap room to play with to build a winning team. His team plays in the worst conference in recent history and we are projected to win 30 games. I would not give this a passing grade.

As stated in the parent-teacher progress report, I disagree that part of Chris Grant’s problem is NOT reading box scores and advanced stats; rather, I think it’s the exact opposite. With the “shocking” Tristan Thompson and Dion Waiters picks especially, and maybe Bennett, Grant has shown a moneyball-oriented approach to basketball, as the two former picks compared very favorably with advanced stats prior to their drafting (or at least I remember John Hollinger’s system loving those two). I feel it is telling that I’m often unable to help but think the sum of the Cavs’ parts is less than the individual pieces, as if the players were drafted by someone trying to build an NBA 2KXX team.

Think about it: a team with Kyrie Irving, Anderson Varejao, Luol Deng (albeit briefly), excellent shooters and rebounders, a plethora of high draft picks, and a proven, accomplished coach will have to win 10 games in a row to even sniff .500. Basically, Grant has totally had difficulty “conceptualizing how players will actually fit on the team he’s already assembled, and how coaches will develop those players and put them in a position to succeed”… that sums up Grant there to me.

I think the grade on Zeller is low, he was thrown in as a starter last year as a rookie because of injuries. This year, after Bynum was traded and being a regular rotation player he has improved his numbers quite a bit and shown aggressiveness that was not present before. At #19, it is a crap-shoot and every draft you will find random players that perform better although drafted later in that area.

All of the grades are either reasonable or too low; certainly none too high.

Too low: TT. Most people still rate him higher than JV, and there might have been problems with JV.

KI: NS gave an I for getting KI, the best player of the last three years because, it was a “no brainer”. But he also gave an F for AB this year, when there was no reasonable alternative. That should either be an A + F, or I + I. You can’t have it both ways.

TZ: Better than a D. How about comparing better players taken later with worse players taken earlier?

I totally agree with Nate that the Cavs are looking a mess, but must call him when he blames the polar vortex on Waiters and Grant.

Rose,Hinrich, Booze, Deng out and they are over 500, I give Mike Brown a big D so far for a lot of reasons, he always comes up with excuses like they played harder, we just didn’t shoot well , we didn’t play defense and I can go on and on and on. TT is probably the best Grant has done, as far as waiters, he was not the best fit or best player at 4. I believe Bennett is a project and could turn out as a good pick. My blame goes to coaching staff, Brown is a defense first coach and he needs a decent offensive assistant. Brown is afraid of hiring somebody that may threaten his job . I’am disappointed so far and I don’t know what else I can say, except they better do something and soon.Go Cavs

Tom the only non-moneyball approach move he made was the Jaret Jack signing. The Bynum deal was moneyball-esque. The earl clark deal deal is very moneyball-esque it just didn’t pan out yet. When his non guaranteed 4.5 million dollar salary for next year is used in a trade however it will be a very nice move. I firmly believe that Jaret Jack was not Chris Grant’s idea or doing. He’s pretty much the antithesis of everything Grant had been doing. He screams of Mike Brown and/or Dan Gilbert to me.

I also don’t think that the Tristan pick is praised enough. Maybe Valancunius turns out to be the better player but missing 1 player does not make a pick bad or even average.
The other he got at least the 3rd best player taken in the top 10 and I would argue that he’s better than Leonard so he’s minimum the 4 best player in the whole draft. Other players drafted that year’s top 10 include

Klay Thompson and Kwahi Leonard I firmly believe would not have turned out to be the players they are now if they were put in a different situation. Leonard still struggles to handle the ball and clearly he would of been asked to do that alot here. Klay may have been great here but Curry was clearly an established threat as were Monte Ellis and David Lee. That team created a lot of space for him to develop into the sniper he is now. Nikola Vucevic is probably the player who if we went back and redrafted I would most consider taking over Thompson. But he didn’t go until 16 so he clearly had a lot of question marks around him at the time and even right now I think I still take Thompson over him but maybe thats the homer in me.

My glass is about a quarter full of scotch and soon will be empty. Grant’s pass/fail really does come down to the Deng incomplete and how the 2013 draft picks improve.

We’ve been patient for three and a half years and a team that wins 30-33 or so games or so doesn’t seem like improvement (even though it is). The optimistic/happy drunk side of me wants to keep being patient. Rebuilding after losing a franchise player wasn’t going to be pretty. The Blazers won 33 games last year and they are one of the top teams in the league this year. For all of Grant’s sins, he’s left himself with the flexibility to fix the problems that plague the roster. Thompson has grown each season and he’s already a suitable starter. Next year could be his leap year. You already have a marketable star in Irving. If you can resign Deng to 3 years/$42 mllionish, than you’d have a core that could work together. Dion, Zeller, Bennett and Karasev could emerge also, or they could be traded for players who fit the Irving, Thompson, Deng core.

The pessimistic/angry blackout drunk side of me says make a decision at the trade deadline. If the team is within a game of the 8 seed, keep the corse. The East standings are settling closer to where we thought they’d be. If the chemistry/effort issues are better then, I’d stand pat. If the team is four games out of the last playoff seed and giving the same uneven results, I’d start trading away what doesn’t fit longterm.

A pretty good grading analysis, Nate. It’s nitpicking, but I’m going to opine on two items:

1) The #1 drafting of a player who only played one year in college, was coming off a serious injury, and had a questionable build to excel at his position. No, I’m not talking about Bennett- I’m talking about Kyrie. I think you’re being influenced a bit too much in hindsight to call the Kyrie pick a no-brainer. Many- including myself- were calling Kyrie too big a risk, and were clamoring instead for a Derrick Williams/Kemba Walker mix at #1 and #4. Give Grant a little bit more credit. Even if Kyrie continues his career with major holes in his game, he’s still clearly the talent of that class.

2) Although you started with the Deng trade, and weaved in Bynum, I think the Bynum signing should be graded on it’s own merit, and awarded an A. We all thought that it was a reasonable risk to take from a talent/money standpoint, but the structuring of the contract turned him into an asset even if he flopped (which he did), and netted us an All-Star as a result. That was genius.

I concur with the remainder of your views. Grant has made some quetionable decisions, particularly in the draft, and it is a worthy point to consider how much Gilbert is influencing some of these decisions. In either case, things should be looking much better than they are.

I can’t call the Bynum trade genius unless Deng gets the Cavs somewhere. As I wrote last night, if Luol ends up back with the Bulls, and Cleveland has nothing to show for it, Chris Grant will look really stupid.

I respectfully disagree. Even with half a season of Deng, we will learn one of two things: (1) With the presence of a bonafide leader and two-way player at our most glaring need, the youngsters will grow, get more professional, and learn how to win, or (2) With the presence of a bonafide leader and two-way player at our most glaring need, the team will continue to flounder, convincingly telling us that it’s time to blow the roster up (including the coach) and start over.

Either way, we’ll know something for certain that we wouldn’t have known otherwise.

Nice post Nate. Also think this has been a well-conducted comment thread.

Genuine question for you: how much of college scouting is done by Grant vs. subordinates? Because while we’ve whiffed on some individual picks, there seems to be a coherent philosophy: draft the guy with the highest upside, particularly in weak drafts. And while this hasn’t worked out well, I don’t remember doubting a single pick at the time of the draft.

Also, Grant’s record on trades (look at all of them, not just this season) is phenomenal. I can’t remember a single bad trade; even the Deng deal has close to zero downside. It’s unfortunate that things haven’t worked out, but there has to be a way to keep Grant around, even if it involves bringing in a new head college scout or something similar.

One thing I wanted to come out of this post, that hasn’t really come out: who is out there that should be running the Cavs? George Karl? Donny Walsh? Kevin Pritchard? David Morway? Steve Kerr? Z? Ryan McDonough for the Suns has done an unbelievable job. Phil Jackson? Bill Simmons? And if your vote is Chris Grant, I want to hear that too.

Enjoyable article, but some of your analysis seems pretty biased against Grant.

-The Deng trade deserves a grade- it put the Cavs in pole position to sign an all-star.
-Picking Kyrie deserves a grade.
-Do you really think Grant should have drafted Lilliard over Waiters? Or Barnes with his 10.2 PER?
-Zeller seems to be progressing nicley- a D is harsh. Do you really think Grant should have drafted another PF instead of Zeller?

I really not sure about Hollinger. He was very enjoyable and had alot of great insight but since he got there the Grizz have made some seriously questionable moves imo.
1) The trade with us that pick they might be giving us next year is a very nice pick. They really had no need to include it too, Grant really took them to the shed there. I get that they had to get under the cap but it seems that the Rudy Gay deal would have done that all by itself and all the guys they traded us were on expiring deals anyway. That was a very bad move. The only thing it accomplished was diminish some of the pressure to trade Gay, possibly allowing to get better value in that deal.
2) The Rudy Gay trade really wasn’t that great for them. The Raptors got better value for Gay in my opinion than the Grizzlies did. Prince is terrible and still has 2 years and 15 million due to him.

On the other hand they did get some steals in Ed Davis, Jon Leur and Kosta Koufas (who I wanted the Cavs to trade for). But they still have no permeter threat and desperately need one.

I think that Grant has done a pretty good job and deserves at least one more year. I think the TT pick was exceptional. The Kyrie and Dion picks were good. The Zeller pick was good. The Bennet pick isn’t as bad as is made out to be because there was no one worth drafting in the Top 10. Delladova was a solid find. Not trading Andy Has worked out great because over the last three drafts outside of Anthony Davis and Andre Drummond there aren’t alot of players taken in them that I’d trade Andy for. The Deng trade was solid even if he leaves after this season. We gave up a late lotto selection over the next few years. Thats no big deal if he can help establish a culture.
I think the biggest problem with the team is youth which is by design and that Kyrie isn’t as good as he is still percieved to be by ESPN and the All-Star voters. Ya we have 2 #1 picks and 2 #4 picks but in the 2014 class how high would each go. Would Kyrie crack the top 6? Would TT or Don crack the top 12? would Bennet crack the top 20? I think Dion might crack the top 12 but other than that coming out these guys were all huge risks. There is no way Kyrie beats out Wiggins, Parker or Embliid. Does his 11 games of great play but showing little elite athletism give him enough to bump him over Randle, Exum or Smart? I doubt it. My guess is Kyrie would be 7 right now on Chad Ford’s big board. Dion wa rated pretty highly by the advanced stats guys but I still think Saric, Vonleh, Gordon, and Lavine (a very similiar player actually) go ahead of him. He would fall somewhere between 8-14 in my opinion. Probably be comparable with Hood, Lavine, and Willie-Caulie Stien. Tristan probably goes after the lottery in my opinion. This is not because Chris Grant did a poor job either. Its because not all drafts are created equal.
An interesting question is what would be enough for you to trade him if some other gm does perceive him as the next Chris Paul.

I’m with Peter Welsh and Rodney Mac. Chris Grant deserves a lot more credit than he’s receiving from Nate’s grades. I don’t want to see him replaced REGARDLESS of the outcome of this season. Daryl Morey gets a lot of credit for his Houston approach (moneyball-esque, amassing assets, turning the warchest of assets into something of greater value, etc.). I feel like we have often compared CG’s approach to roster building to Sam Presti/OKC simply because we have been in the high lottery in three consecutive years a la OKC. While that does draw a comparison between CLE and OKC, I think Grant’s roster building philosophy is more similar to Morey. Lots of small moves designed to gain as many assets/flexibility moving forward. If that’s his endgame, then we are positioned perfectly to make moves like the one we made to land Luol Deng. And the cupboard’s not bare, we still have plenty of extra draft picks and cap flexibility to get another marquee player via trade. I don’t want Hollinger, Phil Jackson, Bill Simmons (although it’d be entertaining), Steve Kerr, etc. I want Chris Grant because he deserves at least a 3.0 GPA or higher and continuity in the franchise’s roster building philosophy is worth a lot more than changing directions when our rebuild is well underway.

Ghost: I have to take issue with your treatment of Steve Kerr. Kerr did a fine job running the Suns. He drafted Goran Dragic, and Robin Lopez, both very good picks (I don’t blame Kerr for the fact that Lopez had to leave to develop. Kerr was long gone by then). He brought in Matt Barnes, Jared Dudley and Grant Hill. He was given goofy mandates by Robert Sarver: make the playoffs… no, WAIT, save money. No, make the playoffs…

Phoenix had a 54-28 record in 2009, getting to the Western conference finals. Things only fell apart after he resigned and Lon Babby started handing out ridiculous contracts. Of course Kerr did draft Earl Clark…

Donny Walsh, similarly, did well in New York, acquiring assets to build a playoff team, before Dolan screwed it up by trading all of New York’s assets when they could have just waited 6 months to get Melo in free agency. Walsh drafted Jordan Hill, Timofey Mozgov, Dino Gallinari. He picked up Landry Fields (who was good with the Knicks), Wilson Chandler, and Felton (not so good).

Then, after Walsh left, Dolan screwed it all up by wasting his Amnesty that he could have used to get out from under the Amare contract.

Donny Walsh ran Indiana last year while Larry Bird was away. He didn’t screw it up.

Hah. My point about the article was that on any other team besides the loaded Spurs, Kawhi Leonard would be an all-star. I don’t know if there’s any chance that TT ends up better than Leonard. So giant missed opportunity there.
Of course, I was really tired.

The Lineup: (Click for Author’s Archive)

Nate Smith is an Associate Editor. He grew up in Anchorage, Alaska, and moved to NE Ohio in 2000. He adopted the Cavs in 2003 and graduated from Kent State in 2009 with a BA in English. He can be contacted at oldseaminer@gmail.com or @oldseaminer on Twitter.

Tom Pestak is an Associate Editor. He's from the west side of Cleveland and lives and (mostly) dies by the success and (mostly) failures of his beloved teams. You can watch his fanaticism during Cavs games @tompestak.

Robert Attenweiler is a Staff Writer. Originally from OH, he's long made his home in NYC where he writes plays and screenplays (www.disgracedproductions.com) some of which end up being about Ohio, basketball or both. He has also written for The Classical and the blog Raising the Cadavalier. You can contact him at rattenweiler@gmail.com or @cadavalier.

Benjamin Werth is a Staff Writer. He was born in Cleveland and raised in Mentor, OH. He now lives in Germany where he is an opera singer and actor. He can be reached at blfwerth@gmail.com.

Cory Hughey is a Staff Writer. He grew up in Youngstown, the Gary, Indiana of Ohio. He graduated from Youngstown State in 2008 with a worthless telecommunications degree. He can be contacted at theleperfromwatts@yahoo.com or @coryhughey on Twitter.

David Wood is our Links Editor. He is a 2012 Graduate of Syracuse University with an English degree who loves bikes, beer, basketball, writing, and Rimbaud. He can be reached on Twitter: @nothingwood.

Mallory Factor is the voice of Cavs: The Podcast. By day Mallory works in fundraising and by night he runs a music business company. To see his music endeavors check out www.fivetracks.com. Hit him up at Malloryfactorii@gmail.com or @Malfii.

John Krolik is the Editor Emeritus of Cavs: The Blog. At present, he is pursuing a law degree at Tulane University. You can contact him at johnkrolik@gmail.com or @johnkrolik.

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